Having a complete LinkedIn profile makes you 40 times more likely to receive opportunities through the network, so it’s important that you take the time to fill it out properly and make sure it stands out from competition. On average recruiters will look at your profile for around 6 seconds, giving you a tiny window of opportunity to capture their attention before they move on to the next potential candidate.

If you’re unsure about how to give your LinkedIn profile the ‘wow factor’ that will get you noticed, Leisure Jobs have put together this informative guide, outlining everything your profile needs from an attention grabbing headline, to the perfect profile picture.

Your Profile:

Headline –

Your headline is the most important part of your profile and is what people will see when you appear in search results. Make sure it is succinct, creative and includes key words related to your role and industry. LinkedIn scans for keywords, so avoid wacky job titles and stick to things that expand on your professional job title.

Name –

Use your proper full name. Stay professional and avoid nicknames.

Profile Picture –

People will build their first impression of you based on your profile picture, so make sure it is professional, high quality and makes you look approachable. No photo at all is an absolute no no, as profiles with an image get 14 times more views than those without.

URL –

Customise your URL to your name so that it is easy for people to find you. You can edit your URL by clicking on the light grey box below your name and photo.

Summary –

Write a concise description of your professional background, including your present and future career goals and ambitions, your most valuable assets and other key information about who you are and what you do. It’s also a good idea to include contact information (phone number & email address), so that people know how they can get hold of you.

To give your profile an extra edge, you can include media, such as videos, slideshares, articles, etc. which demonstrate your skills and abilities and add credibility to the claims made in your summary.

Experience –

Like on your resume, you should list you work history, with details such as job title, employer and dates worked there. You should also add a brief summary of your responsibilities and achievements from each job, ideally in bullet points for skim reading. You can complement each entry with media attachments related to the particular job. Avoid using buzzwords as recruiters get bored of reading cliches; however keywords will boost your visibility in searches.

Projects –

Add any significant projects that you have worked on and demonstrate your skills. You can add links to these projects, as well as the details about who you worked on the projects with.

Education –

Include information about degrees acquired and schools/colleges attended. Though the education section is more important to entry-level professionals, even later in your career it gives you the opportunity to connect with other alumni for networking opportunities.

Skills and Endorsements –

Add skills that are relevant to your professional role, background and interests. These will help you to appear in search results when people enter these specific terms and people who add skills to their profile get 13 times more views than others. Other users are then able to endorse you for the skills that they think you are particularly good at, adding credibility to them.

Your Network:

Connections –

Try to create at least 300 connections, as this will expand your network so that you have access to more profiles. Try not to exceed 3,000 connections however, so that you can keep use of the platform practical. Be strategic about who you connect with, limiting it to people in your industry, past and present colleagues/clients and business prospects.

Groups –

Join groups to maximise LinkedIn’s networking potential and gain ability to contact other group members.

Recommendations –

Recommendations are written by other LinkedIn users to recognise good work and notable achievements. These are a great way of marketing yourself as a credible and competent professional, as well as promoting your company’s services. You can get more recommendations by asking previous clients or colleagues for one (see below for step-by-step guide.)

Contacting other users –

Unless you have LinkedIn Premium, you are usually only able to send messages to people within your network; however you can get around this by joining a group and contacting them through there (more info on how below).

Your Company:

Showcase page –

A showcase page is a niche page that branches off the pain company page to promotes a specific product or targets a specific market. You can create up to 10 free showcase pages, on which you should include all the same kind of information as on a company page, such as industry, links and images.

Top Tips:

The best times to post on LinkedIn are Tuesday and Thursday between 7am-9am.

Your profile is 5 times more likely to get viewed if you join and are active in groups.

If you’re looking for a new job, you can turn off your activity broadcasts so that your boss doesn’t see.

Publishing on LinkedIn is a great way to demonstrate your professional knowledge and create a voice for yourself in your industry.